You currently have javascript disabled. Several functions may not work. Please re-enable javascript to access full functionality.

Welcome to Ultimate Subaru Message Board, my lurker friend!

Welcome to Ultimate Subaru Message Board, an unparalleled Subaru community full of the greatest Subaru gurus and modders on the planet! We offer technical information and discussion about all things Subaru, the best and most popular all wheel drive vehicles ever created.

We offer all this information for free to everyone, even lurkers like you! All we ask in return is that you sign up and give back some of what you get out - without our awesome registered users none of this would be possible! Plus, you get way more great stuff as a member! Lurk to lose, participate to WIN*!

Say hello and join the conversation

Subscribe to topics and forums to get automatic updates

Get your own profile and make new friends

Classifieds with all sorts of Subaru goodies

Photo hosting in our gallery

Meet other cool people with cool cars

Seriously, what are you waiting for? Make your life more fulfilling and join today! You and your Subaru won't regret it, we guarantee** it.

* The joy of participation and being generally awesome constitutes winning** Not an actual guarantee, but seriously, you probably won't regret it!

No, 5 lug conversion is out. Need something to work on the front, and something to work on the rear. I think that the rear would not be so hard to do....its the front that is difficult....and stay with 4x140.

Or...if some one can point me in the direction of someone who will rebuild and revalve my stock struts to something seriously stiff, I'll be happy.

doesn't Subaru Styles have coilovers in the back of his wagon? I know he has the 5 lug, but the rear shocks are the same.. You might be able to modify coilovers for an early 90s Civic, they might be small enough.

McPhearson struts pretty much are coil overs. I see the ones in that picture above have a very large bushing on the strut cap. Is that the only difference from a new OEM strut?

I guess I question what buying expensive 'coil overs' will gain you over swaping in new strut assemblies (springs, cap, seat, bushings, and strut cartraiges). Doesnt KYB make some bolt on stuff for EA82? I know they do for the Legacys.

Only time so far ive seen a need for custom coil overs was the guy who had his subframes welded together, a big suspension lift (where the coilovers were key), and a body lift with 30" tires.

I am making some for the front, they are for off-road use but a shorter version would work for a streeter
I went through Monroe's size/fitment charts and found a strut CARTRIGE that is off of a heavier car (stifer valving) and plan to make new strut bodies that will have adj. mounts for 3" OD coil-over springs. I am using big ball-joints into a steel plate for the upper mounts. They will be tuff, adjustable, have NO rubber bushings/mounts at all! And I can change out the springs for any size/ stifness I want

The coil overs I was speaking of are inverted if you look at the picture provided you will see the telescoping portion is 40mm ...... go look at your struts they may be a little smaller. The cartridges are gravel spec Bilstein units. OR you could go buy effectively they same thing from DMS for like $3500- $4000.

Okay so these you adjust the dampening directly; not just the springs ?

While many coilovers are damping adjustable as well (like the DMS Golds on my 2.5RS), I was referring to height adjustment instead (which are common to all "coilovers") by raising/lowering the spring perch.

For example, Ground Control offers "coilover kits" (similar to the kit used by the guy in the XT6.net thread I linked to) that mount over a strut/shock and have adjustable spring perches and various available spring rates. In this case, whether it has adjustable damping would obviously depend on which strut/shock you used.

I'm probably going to use a Ground Control over either KYB GR2 (non-adjustable) or KYB AGX (adjustable) combo (using the "Impreza" application) for suspension when I do the 5-lug swap on my RX, but I haven't decided how I'm going to handle the rear yet.

I am curious as to why you would ever want to change your suspensions settings if they were optomised for your car? The weight of your car should not change much. If you had an expert build your suspension with you cars weight, drive, and intended use in mind are you sure you want to change these settings.

I have tuned suspension for full suspension bikes (downhill, and cross country) and motocross. Only to have the units I tuned come back with their owners looking all sheepish, saying I thought I could make it better. How do I put it back?

Give somebody a clicker and they will turn it!

If your going to "tune" your suspension be sure to take notes!

The suspension I was showing you is for rally specification. If you are not going to jump or slide your car it is not likely needed.

Well....from reading what you typed, the stock GL-10 suspension, even an RX's, is not one but suitible to how I am driving the cars.

Cornering: Fast and hard. in order to go fast, it must be able to get the tires to hook up. Having +2 deg of camber does not help at all. Soft springs and dampers dont help either. Sitting so high doesnt help either. The caster could be imporved upon as well....So, camber plates, higher rate springs/shorter springs have given it -2.5 or better camber, the plates provide camber as well, and caster too. Now the tires are hooked up...as long as there are so sharp bumps, as the dampers are worn way out...and are too weak for the springs.

As for Rally...i think a STOCK RX suspension would be great! It sits up just right, and the spring/damper combo is very good on those cars for rally...But...id throw some camber/caster plates on to get it as close as possible to 0 or maybe even a tad of negative camber.

Well....from reading what you typed, the stock GL-10 suspension, even an RX's, is not one but suitible to how I am driving the cars.

Cornering: Fast and hard. in order to go fast, it must be able to get the tires to hook up. Having +2 deg of camber does not help at all. Soft springs and dampers dont help either. Sitting so high doesnt help either. The caster could be imporved upon as well....So, camber plates, higher rate springs/shorter springs have given it -2.5 or better camber, the plates provide camber as well, and caster too. Now the tires are hooked up...as long as there are so sharp bumps, as the dampers are worn way out...and are too weak for the springs.

As for Rally...i think a STOCK RX suspension would be great! It sits up just right, and the spring/damper combo is very good on those cars for rally...But...id throw some camber/caster plates on to get it as close as possible to 0 or maybe even a tad of negative camber.

It is quite possible your stock suspension is not one butt suitable for your type of driving.

Like I said if your dampening was optomised for your intended use, there is little left to be gained by minute valving changes. Everything you said above was about set up, not dampening settings. The only exception is with your statement about the RX suspension, that I agree with for a low cost option. The RX stockers work quite well! The cost to grin ratio is quite high!

For those confused about the above references you may want to read this.

Thats a god article! Yes, if the dampers were properly setup for the springs/my type of driving, I dont think 24 levels of adjustment would be so much better....but It would help fine tune things for slightly different situations...IF one knew what to do.

I know Pleiades has adjustable dampening levels on his Tein Coil Overs...and he adjusts them differently for street and for different autox's...i know he had them softer for me when i autox'd it....but when he autox'd it, be hard'n it back up. Makes the car faster...but less forgiving.

I am curious as to why you would ever want to change your suspensions settings if they were optomised for your car? The weight of your car should not change much. If you had an expert build your suspension with you cars weight, drive, and intended use in mind are you sure you want to change these settings.

I have tuned suspension for full suspension bikes (downhill, and cross country) and motocross. Only to have the units I tuned come back with their owners looking all sheepish, saying I thought I could make it better. How do I put it back?

Give somebody a clicker and they will turn it!

If your going to "tune" your suspension be sure to take notes!

The suspension I was showing you is for rally specification. If you are not going to jump or slide your car it is not likely needed.

That's kind of what I was getting at.... especially since these coil overs are just height adjstable and the dampening is not adjustable. Might as well buy some Subaru adjustables (height) which were compeltly designed for Subarus and save yourself some money and trouble.

By the way 'coil over' does not mean 'adjustable' it means the coil is around (over) the shock absorber. Lots of suspension systems do not use coil overs ( or struts) but rather use springs and seperate, external shocks. My '88 GL was a 2WD and had 'coil overs' that are not adustable.

Morgan, I agree with you completely only the stock suspension was originally intended for picking up the kids, not auto or rally cross.

I would however liken the difference in the RX dampening to the new STI stuff. For most applications this would be great.

For sporty type tarmac stuff you will more than likley want to look at lowering the ride height significantly (1" range)This will lead to bottoming problems. And can only be properly corrected by increasing both compression and rebound dampening and spring rate. (this is generally done with a shorter overall damper too) If you know where to look, there is reading to find the base settings for an all wheel drive turbocharged rally car for both tarmac and gravel. (Ford is really nice and publishes information they derived from their WRC experience for privateers)

With the above being said, after driving a car properly set up for gravel stage rally on both gravel and tarmac I would not care to spend the extra cost for tarmac only setup. The gravel set up on tarmac is so much better than what can be achieved for much much greater sums of money. And this was at gravel height!